Seib & Wessel: Cyber Terrorists Target U.S.

2/22/2013 11:14AM

WSJ reporter Siobhan Gorman says the recent cyberattacks have revived concerns over U.S. vulnerability to foreign hackers. A key concern: how the government and business sector can defend themselves against future attacks.

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

... I ... I ... your friends you're just referring to ... the security twirls and want to not worry about sequester unless you days but something you've been writing about but want time which is ... computer hackers from place called China mostly ... having lost love a success with um and I guess the reality is you know now that it reveals is discomfort we I mean it's interesting that the whole hacking issue seems to kind of coming going Salinger's and I think just that ... lately in last few weeks really we just kind of scene and take up to it and I'm sometimes the stories feed on each other we actually saw something similar and at the beginning of two thousand ten when Google was packed in everybody thought that this was going to lead to ... the companies being more comfortable about talking openly about getting packed and people are going to have a much more ... much greater appreciation of ... how widespread it was and how you know just how constant lies and and and ... and so it'll be interesting to see ... how sustain the current interest is the case where what we're seeing here which is a little different from a few years ago was ... the confluence of at least some some initial government actions we had an executive order out of either ... the White House was announced last week to come from though I'd double string of cybersecurity defenses in the private sector ... and then yesterday we saw ... an effort to ... crack down on the theft of trade secrets and in the interim we've seen ... lots of stories about the media getting hacked an additional Chinese hacking and peppers that ... into the cybersecurity world have been kind of that now aam but it's just it's it's taken on a much greater elevated importance ... so clearly if you again attention for an issue ... like this is the fact that preceded in euro terms of the last year you get the the the ... so that I was I worried about that ... yet yet they they do not like the idea that ... I've that they knew they would be in some sort of tussle with the media ... so it'll be interesting also to see how this plays out kind of geopolitically ... would to the U S ... is a corporate or public sector to think of and often tear or we will see to that effect at the US has thought about our fence for quite some time to expand ... I the idea of going on the fence in cyberspace basically means just launching a cyber attack on somebody else and certainly not ... us some examples of that with this stocks Matt virus that knocked about and then the bronze nuclear program ... aam but I mean I think that the U S a segment on the offensive business for a long time it's still very ... I've tended to have both about employee and certainly about talking about and I mean it still basically required to sign off from the president to authorize an offensive for it I still think in the longer run that that the implications of this may be bigger in the private sector ... and governments ... and and those of us to talk with business leaders know how incredibly attentive as to how incredibly worried they are and have been for some years about her vulnerabilities so I was at a conference of the will Street Journal ... chief information officers ... it'll be a hard time making conversation during a cocktail party someone is standing line was ... so what he worry about ... everyone was ... so yes yes I received now everyone to know is that it fails because ... I mean they're they're stealing tons and tons of information eighteen lots of the market ... the Chinese but it's lots lots of folks in and it's also a need for for the financial sector until it's all the Russian cyber crime ... I and and the banks of been contending with these Iranian cyber attacks so ... it's it's it's a whole mix of stocks and what's been really difficult I think from the standpoint of companies is actually thinking how much they are losing out that I mean they can calculate ... the milk down time if their website is not top line ... baking cunning of calculating the concert to cut their losses when money is still in calculating the cost of a playful property theft is really in name only to find out that one ... they certainly don't wanna admit it even if you're the last return